Hi rzt, just to let you know, that article was retracted by Attentional as the analysis was incorrect, mainly on the basis, that it is impossible to look at the ITV1 London audience in Scotland in the BARB files.

I do wonder if the whole Upstairs Downstairs project is actually worth it. I watched last night, it was decent well made traditional drama if a bit rushed, but I found myself comparing it to Downton Abbey........and I dont even watch Downton Abbey! UD is stuck in the middle of the irresistable force and the immovable object-Downton Abbey and the original UD respectively. Fans of both are continuously lining up to say that this show isnt as good as that. And that wont ever change for however long the modern series lasts. Have to say my other gripe was knowing who the characters were-the Beeb should maybe have repeated the first three at some point.
UD did get decent figures and if you had told me in past years that an ITV primetime line up of DOI C/S and WAH would be beaten by BBC opposition I would have found it hard to believe. BTW Countryfile last night was effectively a repeat although they are called "specials" for some reason. AR got a strong figure overall despite its overlap with C/S. C/S itself did well to get the figures it did and CTM rounded off one of the best first runs for a drama this century-although there is an enormous amount to live up to next time. The Beeb have done a job on WAH and DOI this year-the former looks very tired now.

Ah, okay. I suspect the ITV1 London audience in Scottish is pretty low though anyway (around 100k).

Incidentally as you're around, I was wondering if you have the separate 'live' and 'VOSDAL' ratings from last night for DOI, Corrie, WAH , CTM, U/D and Homeland.please? I bet there was a lot of same day timeshifting going on so it'd be interesting to see which shows in particular were timeshifted a lot and watched later in the evening. Thanks in advance.

erm a few issues

data is now live, but that's subject to change

BIngo full house, The Big Bang Theory has finally managed a clean sweep of all 10 of E4+1's top ten in the the new Barb update.

A decent start (and deservedly so) for Homeland on Channel 4. We'll see how it settles in the coming weeks but that certainly seems to be above everyone's expectations. It does make you wonder how it might have done in an 'easier' 10PM slot during the week.

Good night for BBC1. Call the Midwife performed fantastically. I wonder if looking at these figures they might be tempted to shift it to 9PM next year. On paper that would give them a run of Sherlock, Midwife and then Upstairs Downstairs at 9PM Sunday during the first quarter. Not too shabby.

On the subject of Upstairs Downstairs a solid if rather unspectacular start for it. Realistically that's in line with what should be expected but running out of Midwife expectations were obviously heightened somewhat. As with Homeland we'll see where it settles in the weeks to come.

Excluding Corrie (which over performed) ITV had a bit of a rough night. It has now become very obvious that they're going to have to rethink this Dancing on Ice/Wild At Heart pairing for next year.


I'm still somewhat amazed that Sky let Homeland slip through their fingers in the first place. I was fairly sure they'd snap it up.

New look 5 News from ITN:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mrizj8Mgwo4

Weather:

http://www.thisisfive.co.uk/news2012/4.jpg

First full bulletins at 5 and 6:30.

As I don't watch 5 News not really able to say whether it's an improvement or not

I think what our analysis shows is that even if DA s1 had aired in the whole of Scotland, it would have averaged less than s1 of Call The Midwife - probably close, around 10.4m to 10.6m, but still second.


It's unfortunate the Beeb weren't able to get UD on air quicker. It was commissioned before Downton, filmed before Downton, they just decided to hold it back till Christmas.

With considerable hindsight, they might have been better trotting it out in summer 2010, or by early September that year at the latest...

As you truly said ''with considerable hindsight''

As Downton series 3 is currently being filmed perhaps you advocate that should be rushed on air ahead of the Olympics ?

Not wishing to be pedantic, but we should probably talk in terms of the "excluding North & Central Scotland audience", given that those in the Scottish Borders don't suffer from the STV/ITV fall-out...

Of course, with BBC shows, it is the whole of Scotland that loses out when River City or some other tripe is shown in favour of shows Scots actually want to watch, driving reported official BBC ratings down more...

Eh?

My point was that if Upstairs... had aired first, everyone would have compared Downton to that, not the other way round.

I'm not sure what your point is!

Theme music is worse, graphics are greatly improved. For example, this (old style):

http://www.tv-live.org.uk/wp/media/f.../graphics7.jpg

looks cheap and nasty compared to this (new style):

http://www.thisisfive.co.uk/news2012/1.jpg

So it seems ITN have done well. But the proof will be in the pudding and I haven't seen a full length bulletin yet.

A few snippets from BARB:

The Diamond Queen adds 1m and debuts with 7.12m. Whitechapel added 0.9m, finishing on 6.53m

The penultimate episode of Hustle got 6.10m and Prisoners' Wives was up slightly at 5.96m

Top Gear holds firm with 6.16m (+1.2m timeshift)

One Born Every Minute continues to perform strongly with 4.10m (0.74m +1)

Sunday night BBC1 v ITV1

BBC News: 6.60m
Countryfile: 7.41m
Call the Midwife: 10.42m
BAFTA's: 5.45m

Dancing On Ice: 7.47m
Wild at Heart: 7.11m
Dancing On Ice: The Skate Off: 6.17m

Celebrity Juice hits all time high with 2.74m. A weekly reach of just under 4m across four showings.

A bit of addition & subtracting surely - taking out STV, adding in the timeshift?

I see Robbie "Dr Evil" Sykes, plotting tv ratings domination, still isn't happy with the schedulers - nothing new there!

My reaction to last night's numbers:

- Brilliant for Call The Midwife, a massive hit, could break 11m in the officials, staggering.

- Decent if not spectacular for Up/Down. A 6.5m overnight for a drama is excellent but its always going to be compared to Downton and thus will always be seen as second best. Should timeshift to near 8m and the overnight may have been dented by less on the night timeshifters due to te later start and competition.

- Good for Corrie, thats a bit better than I thought it would do in that slot. It may have unwittingly helped CTM to a series high too with more people looking for something to watch at 20:30.

- DOI and WAH, as expected really and not great either.

- Good start for Homeland, a very good episode too.

- Being Human was hit but that was expected. Its starting to look very axeable now.

More nails in the overnights coffin there there. When African Heartbeat/Emmerdale With Giraffes is getting an official 7.11m, it is in no danger of the axe. Plenty more strong timeshifts elsewhere.

To paraphrase Barry Davies, "Overnights? Frankly, who cares..."


I doubt 590,000 Northern and Central Scots would have watched Whitechapel, so a very clear win for The Diamond Queen, in week 1 anyway. Might have been tighter last week.

Agent Fincham again?

Or a spectactular cock up by ITV's Operation Stop the Midwives task force? (I've no evidence to suggest GeorgeS heads this up, but he did say he's been very busy at work lately and he's obviously in fantasy mode himself given his last posting... )

Why do you bother popping on here most days if you truly feel that way?

I contribute regularly to my football team's fans messageboard too, but they only play matches once or twice a week - and have 3 months off in the summer...

The overnights are obviously of interest. But they are, as I might have mentioned, increasingly irrelevant when measuring the true viewership of particular programmes.

The chase player percentages in HD homes are staggering compared to SD.

Sky is really denting ad watching on ITV.

Oh come on it was a good little quote from the great Barry Davies!

Thanks. So in tabular form: Here's how yesterday's overnights were broken down in terms of 'live' viewers and 'VOSDAL' viewers (viewing later on same day):

........................................Overnight. .......Live.......VOSDAL------- Live (%)
Call The Midwife................9.24...............7.96.... .....1.28...............86%
Coronation Street...............8.27...............7.28...... ...0.99...............88%
Dancing on Ice...................6.80...............6.06.... .....0.74...............89%
Upstairs Downstairs............6.53...............6.01..... ....0.52...............92%
Wild at Heart......................5.74...............5.20 .........0.54...............91%
Homeland..........................1.89............ ...1.68.........0.21...............89%

Intersting to see how many people are timeshifting CTM, presumably thats another 1.8m or so to be added on during the week so should be over 3m in total. Do you know what Downton's Christmas episode had "live"?

The higher "live" percentage for UD also adds weight to the argument that the later start time will have slightly dented the overnight figure.